Ride hailing company Uber Technologies Inc said it has slashed 10% of jobs in the customer service operations as it aims to simplify ranks and “embrace artificial intelligence," according to a report by Bloomberg News.
These job cuts were announced within the community operations team on Wednesday, mentioning that the comapny is working to “to simplify operations, strengthen in-person collaboration, and continue to embrace AI,” the report quoted an Uber spokesperson's email. Additionally, the employees, working remotely for the team were asked to relocate to a hub office, as part of Uber's return-to-office mandate, according to the spokesperson.
“Our organization has become too complex and siloed,” the report quoted a memo by Megha Yethatika, Uber's vice president of global community operations. She added that the department “has made some strides” in using AI, “but to unlock this potential, we need an effective organization to layer AI on. We cannot scale frontier technology on top of fragmented processes.”
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With its recent plans, Uber joins major firms such as financial services company Block Inc, cloud company Oracle Corp., who have been citing AI as a reason for job cuts in recent months.
The latest development marks the first time when Uber has linked layoffs to AI efficiency pushes and is the second round of reductions in less than two months to simplify team structures.
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The ride hailing company had cut 23% of its so-called people division, representing less than 1% of its 34,000 global employees in June, as a new president took over. Uber has not provided specific data on the size of its customer service operation.
In May, the company said it would slow hiring due to the internal use of AI, however it is still recruiting for more than 500 roles on its jobs page, which includes engineers to support robotaxi partnerships.
(With inputs from Bloomberg News)
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